Nursery rhymes: the good and the bad

From the BBC: "When modern parents expose their kids to vintage nursery rhymes they're engaging with a centuries-old tradition that, on the surface at least, is not only harmless, but potentially beneficial. But what about those twisted lyrics and dark back stories? To unpick the meanings behind the rhymes is to be thrust into a world not of sweet princesses and cute animals but of messy clerical politics, religious violence, sex, illness, murder, spies, traitors and the supernatural."